John Garamendi: “Thank you very much for this opportunity. I am particularly pleased to have the opportunity to follow my colleagues on…”

“Thank you very much for this opportunity. I am particularly pleased to have the opportunity to follow my colleagues on the Republican side as they were talking about the tax bill that passed the House of Representatives, the Senate, and was signed into law last December. I always like to start my discussions here on the floor by some sense of purpose, some sense of what, at least, I, and I think many of my Democratic colleagues are trying to accomplish and the many different ways that this might be accomplished. But this is a statement of values. It comes from Franklin Delano Roosevelt during the Great Depression. It could easily apply to the Great Recession in 2008 and `09, and it even applies today, and certainly applies to the tax cut that took place in December. Let me read this to you. He said, Franklin Delano Roosevelt: ``The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.'' A statement of value. A statement of purpose. Having listened to my colleagues talk about the great tax cut, I think we need to understand exactly what it was all about and the implications of that tax cut and what it means to America, not just to the working men and women that was so well discussed by our colleagues. And indeed, they did get a benefit from the tax cut. However, I think we need to understand the size of that tax cut.…”